Gentleness requires courage

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Violent emotions are not sustainable long-term sources of energy for the struggle. True gentleness is not an absence of anger, but a transformation of anger from the impulse to harm into an unconquerable will to protect and endure.

 

Gentleness is not the willingness to ignore abuse, but a powerful balance that prevents us from being involuntarily triggered and drawn off course. Gentleness is anger brought completely in harness to our highest values. When we are truly gentle, our power cannot be triggered by fate, nor manipulated by others.

 

Gentleness requires more courage than does violence and demands constant training as intense as that for any battle. Gentleness is not a hiding place from life, but a fortress of peace lying beyond the reach of any indignity from fate or foe. To be truly gentle does not mean to leave the struggle for a better world. Gentleness is the art of living in the eye of life’s storms. True gentleness simply means to be in full possession of our own hearts.

                     Jim Rigby

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They simmer and fester

Deep in the soul

 

The anger, dare I say hate?

Those emotions that are both violent and lead to violence.

 

There is energy there

Fire

And the pressure builds

Until we act out, our emotions making our choices

rather than our brains

 

We are in the territory of demons

What else can we call them

These malign thoughts

This foul presence

 

The feelings are not unfounded.

The greed is real

So are the abuses of power, and the lies

The harm is real

People are oppressed, and freedom is stolen

Children are killed

 

People in power do evil things,

And do not care (do you?)

 

How can we not be mad!  How can we not respond with every fiber of our being?

How can we not resist, violently, angrily!

 

And yet we live in the shadow of the cross

Or perhaps, on this day, the firing squad

 

And the words of Jesus echo:

Forgive them

Today you will be with me in paradise

Mother, behold your son

Behold your mother

 

On that day, in the midst of the pain and brutality

The injustice

There was peace

A peace that was beyond understanding

 

There was gentleness

 

Just as violence emerges from hate

So gentleness emerges from peace,

 

And peace

Comes because the Lord is near (Philippians)

 

It is peace that guards our hearts and our minds

Peace that makes us

Healers

And the carriers of hope

 

There are too many days when I am not peace-filled

Too many days when my soil is roiled

Too many days when what oozes from my soul are not

The fruits of the Spirit

But the produce of the Flesh

 

I don’t want to be like that

I don’t want to be tossed around by the winds of hate

I don’t want to be manipulated by the likes of Donald Trump

 

I want to be gentle, kind, forgiving

A healer

 

I know I cannot ignore evil.

I cannot step back into silent places of safety

But I can be controlled by love

I can let Jesus have possession of my heart

 

And I can be a safe place

In the midst of the storm

 

And that, that

Is what I want to be

 

Haters will Hate

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“I should be happy, but instead I feel nothing. I feel a lot of nothing these days. I've cried a few times, but mostly I'm empty, as if whatever makes me feel and hurt and laugh and love has been surgically removed, leaving me hollowed out like a shell.”

          Jennifer Niven,

 

As a deer longs for flowing streams, so my soul longs for you, O God.

My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.

When shall I come and behold the face of God?

My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me continually,

“Where is your God?” 

          Palm 42

 

Happy are the pushers, for they get on in the world

Happy are the hard-boiled, for they never let life hurt them

Happy are those who complain, for they get their own way in the end

Happy are the blasé, for they never worry about their sin

Happy are the knowledgeable, for they know their way around

Happy are the troublemakers, for they make people take notice of them

          J.B. Phillips

___________________________________________________

 

I am tired

Physically, it can be a challenge

To drag this almost 75-year-old body out of bed

 

Everything hurts, and what doesn’t hurt doesn’t work.

 

Mentally, I’m tired

The complexities of life, which once were fun to juggle

Now seem to crash down upon me

 

Spiritually, I am exhausted

 

Exhausted

 

In the “Dead Poets Society,” the teacher tells his students

Don’t use “avoid using the word ‘very’ because it’s lazy. A man is not very tired; he is exhausted. Don’t use very sad, use morose.

 

OK then, I am exhausted and morose.

 

It is debilitating

The spiritual BS that flows like a stream of foul water

From Erica Kirk and Franklin Graham

From Paula White and JD Vance

 

And sometimes, I suspect, from me too

Me too

 

Because I am exhausted and perplexed

And I do not always handle it well

Too often, too often, Lord, I become what I abhor and protest

 

Impatient, angry, strident, empty, and confused

 

But I am tired of the Gospel that is not Gospel

The good news that is truly bad

 

I am tired of the Christian nation that violates Christ

I am tired of those who have doubled down on arrogance rather than humility

Power rather than servanthood

Lies rather than the truth

Violence and killing rather than peacemaking and healing

Hate rather than love

 

I would love to feel as if my soul is watered by flowing streams

But instead, I am soaked

By salty tears

 

I do not know how to move out of my perplexity

Out of my sense that everything is going wrong

And there is nothing I can do.

 

But perhaps perplexity is the point.

Yes, there is nothing I can do

But is there something the Sacred can do?

 

Sometimes I doubt it.

I have every reason to doubt.

Trump is president.  Netanyahu rages uncontrolled.

 

My head and heart tell me to quit

To hide

To be silent

 

Why bother?

 

Why?

Because

 

God

 

Because of the sunrise over the mountain

The smile of a child

The random act of kindness

 

God lives

Love lives

Goodness Lives

 

Call it what you will

(if you can’t call it God, call it something else)

 

But there is something

Dancing in the morning sunlight

 

Something lingering in my soul

That changes my Lament (at least from time to time)

To praise

 

I am not naïve

Haters will hate

Innocents will still die

Bad people will still flourish

Good-hearted people will still be led astray

By liars

 

But I do believe

Even in the midst of my unbelief

That hate will never be

 

The end of the story

 

I believe

That someday, the Kingdom will come

And it is my job

Every day, every single day

 

To live as though it were already here.

How long, O Lord?

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Right now it is achingly clear, heartbreakingly, angrily, clear, that we who believe that God is love and is present, is also a God who is hidden sometimes, sometimes when we are most in need.  The Psalmist cried out, "How long, O Lord, How Long!?

 

How long?

 

Too long. 

 

That seems to be the answer right now.

 

Even Jesus had a "moment."  My Lord, my Lord, why have you forsaken me?"  Why?  Why have you forsaken us?  Why have you allowed creepy, cruel, greedy, uncompassionate, destructive people to rise to power and destroy so much that is good?  Why do you let childish cosplayers blow some of your children out of the water, and blow apart schools full of children, and boast about it?  Why do you let spiritual lightweights lecture a Pope who is literally quoting you? 

 

Why do you let masked thugs throw innocents into concentration camps where they wither away?

 

Why do you let people who would plunder the planet destroy forests and rivers, and violate sacred sites?

 

Why do you let the political bullies like Putin and Netanyahu, and Trump flourish?

 

Why?  Why? Why?

 

I realize, Lord, that you are way more loving than I can ever be.

I realize that you are more patient.

I realize that you see more than I see

I realize that I, too, am a mess who does harmful things, who slides into anger and hate, greed and other destructive things.  And I am thankful that you are patient and loving, forgiving, and restorative.

 

But Lord, I struggle with those who harm and divide, who grab and devour, who rape, and have no regret.  Only a desire for more, more, more.

 

This morning, as I watched the sunrise, I rejoiced, but my joy was blurred by tears

 

Lord, I am perplexed and confused.  I am tired.

I am tired of my own stupidity

I am tired of the stupidity of those around me.

I am tired that we keep choosing poorly.

I am frustrated that you keep loving and forgiving and working to repair and restore

And we keep doing the same things we human creatures have always done

And keep getting what we have always gotten.

 

Pain, destruction, death, injustice, inequity

Hunger, poverty, war.

 

Why?

When?

How Long

How?

 

These are my prayers of desperation

There seems to be no answer

But against all hope

I believe

Two hearts notice

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A whole civilization will die tonight

People will die

Lots of people will die

Women and children will die

 

Have died

Slaughtered in their homes, their schools

We can hear the cries of the mothers and fathers

From here

 

People will die

Homes will be destroyed

Cultures erased

 

Call it what it is

Genocide

 

Why?

So, our leaders say, we can make lots of money

So that the oil will flow

So we will feel big and strong

USA, USA (and Israel too)

 

It is not all Tomahawk missiles,

And air strikes

It is Zionist settlers with bulldozers

It is the IDF, responding to violence and arresting the victims

 

It is the incarcerated being beaten and raped

Immigrant families being torn apart

People disappeared, without due process

 

It is blockades dooming people to a slow death by starvation

It is infants dying in hospitals because there is no electricity

 

And it is not just in Iran, or Lebanon, or Cuba

Not just the Gaza or the West Bank

 

It is in Minneapolis

Washington DC

Texas

Florida

Idaho

Where the ideologically extreme right has decided

Trans people don’t deserve to exist

Women should be subjugated

Poor people should be ignored

The planet should be plundered for money

 

We should not be surprised that

 

So much evil flows from Empire

We watch it happen

Every single day

 

The lies, the violence

The hate mongering, the division

 

What do we do?

Cheer? (some do)

Pretend it isn’t happening (denial is real)

Become numb, and accept it all as normal?

The ramblings of a madman, the dishonesty, the cruelty, and the greed?

 

Do we reach the point where we no longer notice?

No longer let tragedy and atrocity both us?

Where we can simply ignore a powerful white male who brags

That he can grab “them” by their…  (well, you know)

 

Or, do we allow our hearts to break?

And do we let our broken hearts become broken-open hearts (Brian McLaren’s words)

 

Do we remember that God is love

That God cares for all who suffer,

Agonizes over all those in need,

 

And remember too

That we, as those who would follow GodWithUs

As those who experience GodInUs

Should also care

 

That we should be people of compassion.

 

We should look upon the world with eyes

That see

We should approach the world with broken-open hearts

 

Our compassion should be a bridge between

The compassion of God and the pain of the world

 

When we hear of children killed

Justice denied

Victims ignored

 

When we see violence, hunger, homelessness,

Illness, loneliness, despair

All the miseries of humankind

 

When we see someone suffering,

We should say

 

“Someone is suffering, and at least two hearts in the universe notice and refuse to turn away – God’s heart, and my own.”

This stops here!

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Any God who would wander into the human condition, any God who has this thirst to pursue us, had better not be too put off by pain, for that's the way we tend to treat our saviors. Any God who tries to love us had better be ready to die for it.

William Willimon

____________________________________________________________

Sometimes it seems

as if hate is going to win

as if all that is right

all that is good

is coming to an end

 

as on that Friday so long ago

when in the heat of the afternoon

jeers echoed

lashes fell

thorns pierced

hammer blows reverberated

and love took its last breath

 

or did it?

 

perhaps love is made of tougher stuff

perhaps

just perhaps

on that day

God looked in the face of hatred

and brutality

into the face of judgement and rejection

into the face of power and wealth

 

and said

“This Stops Here”

 

and that is why we call it

Good

 

Doomscrolling or hopequesting

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You’re not doomscrolling, you’re hopequesting. You need those tiny pieces of joy from seeing friends and strangers share their art, their good news, their wacky, unique selves. We need light to live. And we find it in each other.”

          Aaron Corwin

 

We thank You, our Creator, for all things bright and good:

The seedtime and the harvest, our life, our health, our food.

Accept the gifts we offer for all Your love imparts;

Accept what You most welcome: our humble, thankful hearts!

All good gifts around us are sent from heav’n above;

Then thank the Lord, O thank the Lord for all His love.

          Matthias Claudius

 

__________________________________________

 

It all depends on what you look for.

True

There is a lot out there that is dark and evil

There are liars in high places

And people who worship money rather than God

 

But we still live on a planet that was God’s first act of incarnation

We still get to see what God is like in Jesus

We still get to experience God all the time

God is around us, with us, and in us.

 

We carry the Sacred

It is woven into our being

We are Sacred children

 

 God is waiting to be found everywhere,

In the darkest corners of our lives,

In the thoughts that wake us in the night

In the brilliant final blast of a sunset

In a random act of kindness

In that rare Facebook post that celebrates kindness

 

 

We find what we seek.

If we look for evil, we find it every time

If we look for what is good, it comes sneaking out of the mundane

 

In the simplest, lightest moments

in the little graces along the way.

 

God is there, he's waiting

in quite obvious and visible places,

wanting to be found

 

When we look for evil, we descend into the house of fear

And live amidst fear and hate

In a place of violence

 

When we look for good, we ascend into

That place where love dwells

And we are permeated with love

 

Transformed

Part of the ongoing incarnation

Of Sacred

 

Then, what we see,

What we think,

Will bear the fruit of gratitude

And hope

 

And seeing the world differently

Through the eyes of grace

We begin, at last

To reflect the divine image

In how we live and breathe and have our being

 

So the question remains.

What do we choose to look for

This day?

 

 

A Macabre Intimacy

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As long as we continue to live as if we are what we do, what we have, and what other people think about us, we will remain filled with judgments, opinions, evaluations, and condemnations. We will remain addicted to putting people and things in their "right" place.

― Henri J.M. Nouwen

 

____________________________________________________________

 

We are often woven together

in macabre intimacy

which drives us into a rigid world

of judgment

and condemnation

 

A world of “us” and “them,”

“win” or “lose,”

“right” or “wrong.”

 

O Sacred one,

you showed us how to live

what it means to be truly human,

how to reflect your image

through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

 

Jesus was not defined by what he had (not much)

the labels he carried (Rabbi)

his ethnicity or race

not even his gender

 

Jesus was defined by the way he loved

And by love alone

 

He did not worry about what people thought about him.

He merely lived out his calling to be

Light, Salt,

God with us

 

Jesus was not blind to the ills of the world

or the weaknesses of others

But he saw more

much more

 

When he looked at people,

he saw not only the failure, but the promise

not only the darkness but the light

not only the human container

(which is why adjectives were not important to him)

 

but also the sacred seed

 

He saw children of God

All beloved

It was not his goal to be “right” while they were wrong.

He simply wanted to be present,

and by his loving presence

transform and heal

and create newness

 

O God

Forgive us for our need to be right

Forgive us for those times when we get hung up on he adjectives

Black, white, male, female, conservative, liberal, American, Iranian

 

Help us to see the Sacred in others

So that the Spirit in us can greet the Spirit in them

Namaste

Shalom

Yo

Saol

 

Do not let us use the wrong things to define ourselves or others

Help us to be present

To be open

To honor and respect

To welcome

To be kind

 

And be

a reflection of your love

 

Giving up is not all bad

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For Lent this year, I’m just giving up.

          Source Unknown

______________________________________

 

Lent is a slow walk with Jesus

Down dusty roads

Through small villages

 

Gathering around tables

Puzzling over parables

Challenged by terrifying teachings

And totally crazy parables that we barely understand

 

Watching the inexplicable

As the lame walk and the blind see

 

Where up is down and out is in

And dead

Is not

 

Stumbling toward Jerusalem

And ground-zero

Where violence, reconciliation

Despair, hope, oppression, and freedom

 

Will come together in a malign

Alchemy

And we will find ourselves on barren ground

At the foot of a cross

 

In these lengthening days

We are called to reflect

Confess, repent, and lament

 

To set aside distractions

And prepare our hearts for holy work.

 

But there are wars and rumors of wars

There are missiles flying and

Children dying

Leaders lying

 

We hear psychopaths invoking Armageddon,

And see Immigrants beaten

Abusers shielded from accountability

Innocence destroyed

Justice denied

 

And we are distracted.

Our best intentions crumble as we doomscroll

And sink further and further into the darkness

 

Losing sight of Jesus as his reality fades

Watching the light disappear into the dark

No longer reflective but anxious

Stuck in lament

 

Unable to take one more step

Toward the garden

Muttering under our breath

 

I give up

 

Which may be the point of Lent

Reaching that place where we sit

And wait

Open and vulnerable

Scared perhaps

 

Until, amazingly

We discover that the darkness cannot

Overcome the light

 

When we once again find ourselves walking

with the One who shows up in those places of

greatest failure and greatest need

 

And says, “Do you love me?

That is all I ask, that you love me.

 

Because I love you and will never abandon you

And implores us

Feed my sheep

 

I am here for you, be there

For others

 

Because that is what this is all about

When we get to the end of the journey, what will matter

 

Is that we have allowed ourselves to be loved

And that we have passed that love along

 

Being love

Loving

 

Everything

Depends on this

Everything

 

Here before we know it

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People sometimes ask me when I became a Christian, and that’s a hard question to answer because I am pretty sure that by the time I asked Jesus into my heart, he’d already been living there for a while.

          Rachel Held Evans

 

“If you love me, show it by doing what I’ve told you. I will talk to the Father, and he’ll provide you another Friend so that you will always have someone with you. This Friend is the Spirit of Truth. The godless world can’t take him in because it doesn’t have eyes to see him, doesn’t know what to look for. But you know him already because he has been staying with you, and will even be in you

          John 14:15-17

 

Jesus asks, "Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?".

          Luke 6:46

_____________________________

 

Hey God

Are you out there?

Somewhere?  Anywhere?

Do you sit in heaven (if there is such a place)

And watch with horror as we make a mess of things?

 

And what are you like, anyway?

Are you aloof and on a throne

Ready to judge the quick and the dead?

 

Every Sunday we pray

Come, O Creator God, and be with us

Come to this special place we have made for you

Beautiful with its stained glass and its peaceful elegance

 

Hey Yahweh

Hey Jesus…

 

Perhaps we have missed the point

What is in a name?

Everything.

 

You gave us a name

I am

Or rather, Whatever I am I will be

 

Yes, you are

You incarnated

You expressed yourself and told us who (and what) you are

 

You are

In the mountains we love, the air we breathe

In the rippling roaring springs

In the cry of the eagle

In every living creature

Even us

 

You gave us a name

And you gave us a person

Jesus

 

And in that name, you told us everything

You said, “I save.”

I rescue, redeem, recreate

 

You are the one who comes into the midst of

The world you have made and

The mess we have made

 

You come while leaders lie and steal

When power is abused

And innocents are killed

And the planet is assaulted in the name of greed

 

You gave us one we call Emmanuel

God with us

One who taught us who you are

You are love

 

But wait, there’s more.

You have told us, promised us

That you are also in us

 

You are pneuma hagion

You are holy, sacred wind

 

It has been said that one cannot catch the wind

But this wind is in us

Restless and powerful

Unsettling

 

It roars through our souls

And it too

Is you

 

You live in us, O Creator

You live in us, O savior

You make ourselves at home in our

Vulnerability

 

And you have one desire.

That we let the wind be wind

That we let your moving, rushing, roaring presence

Make us

Another incarnation

 

But Lord, we stifle the Spirit

We quench your holy fire

We check and constrain the wind

 

We say Lord, Lord

And then live for power or money

We say God is love

And then hate

 

We proudly say your name

We claim your presence and favor

But we deny your presence

 

No one would know you are in residence

By the way we talk, think,

And live

 

Don’t give up on us, Lord

Your very name suggests you won’t

But in your name, missiles rain down on children

Killing and maiming

 

In your name lies are spoken

Laws are broken

Injustice is perpetrated

 

In the actions of Presidents,

And Secretaries of War, and Majority leaders

Your presence is denied

Your name violated

 

Me too

Us too

We, too, sometimes fail to do what you say

 

But still, you stay

You are

You are in us to save

You are in us to heal and empower

 

Lord, when we are in the midst of strife and division

When everything seems to be disintegrating

Lord, when we feel so alone

And cry out for your presence

 

Remind us that you are already here.

 

In Silent Agony

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Prophecy is the voice that God has lent to the silent agony, a voice to the plundered poor, to the profaned riches of the world

          Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel

________________________________

 

 

The world screams

The not-so-silent cry of a plundered planet

The wild rants of the rich and powerful

Shrouding silent screams of loneliness and fear

The soft sobbing of the abused, cowering

The whispered fear of children, wondering if today a shooter will come

The anguished pleas of the immigrant being kidnapped by ICE

The revelations of sexually abused young women, heard but not believed

The desperate and angry words of the person caught in poverty and injustice

 

We hear them

The suffering ones

But we do not hear the silent agony of the soul

That deep rending pain

That can only be hinted at

Dropped into the world half-formed 

 

Sometimes we are left speechless

We watch as evil people lie and manipulate

Belittle and bully

We hear fear disguised as patriotism

and prejudice portrayed as justice

We are overwhelmed by the hunger, the empty eyes,

Stunned by the bodies filling the doorways, sidewalks and underpasses

Because there is no room in the inn

 

But we cannot be silent

We must speak with

We must speak for

 

We must join our voices with others

And we must be the voice when all others are silent

We must respond to the silent agony

 

Hearing the words in the silence

Hearing the pain hidden in the hate-filled rants

The loneliness caught in the throat

The hopelessness unuttered

 

We must be a voice

Saying “This stops here”

“That is not the truth”

“There is hope”

“You are forgiven”

“You are loved”

 

Prophets all

We are called to proclaim God

To proclaim love

We are called to speak truth

 

And we are called to change the world

To claim and reclaim

To restore and transform

 

The arc of history may bend toward justice

Toward equity

Toward love

 

But only if we help bend it

You can't go back

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All freedom journeys require an open mind—a mind that is not conditioned by past knowledge and experience, but open to possibility. Questioning opens the doors of our imagination, enabling us to consider alternatives to the status quo. Unless one is capable of imagining another possible reality, one cannot free oneself from bondage.…

 

The compulsion to repeat the past is apparent in the biblical myth of the Exodus. When Moses led the Israelites to freedom, they often yearned to return to Egypt. Though they were miraculously provided for throughout their forty years of wandering in the desert, the Israelites were often nostalgic for the “good old (bad) days” in Egypt:.. “ They missed the predictability and sense of control they felt in Egypt—where everything was known. Though in actuality they were oppressed and enslaved by the Egyptians, the Israelites looked back on their time in Egypt with nostalgia because they could not bear the uncertainty they faced as a free people.

          Estelle Frankel

 

For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

          Paul

__________________________________________

 

We seem to love the prisons we have created for ourselves

Even the tombs we have dug ourselves.

 

We prefer confinement to freedom

Safety to possibility

 

We do not trust the One who sets us free

But instead turn again and again to what enslaves us

The God (s) of our own making

 

Our God (s) are “that about which we are ultimately concerned” (Tillich)

We need only look at the systems we created

Economic, social, and political

To understand which ruler we have chosen.

 

The center of our worship is no longer the church or cathedral

We bow down in front of the corporate monument

We prostrate ourselves before gilded palaces and magnificent ballrooms

And whose image glares down at us

From the façade?

 

We may believe in God

But what gods shape our lives and determine our priorities

 

We are called by One who would set us free

Into uncertainty

We are called to let go of so much

The myth of exceptionalism

 

Or belief that progress is inevitable

The delusion that we can have it all

 

An ever-expanding economy

Universal prosperity

Healthy bodies

A healthy planet

 

We are called forward by a God who wants to lead us

To a new heaven and a new earth

 

But we are slaves

That is who we are

Slaves to an illusory past (that never really existed)

Slaves to the way of domination

Where might makes right a peace comes through coercion

 

Slaves to a belief that life is all about

Winners and losers

And that the one who dies with the most cryptocurrency

Wins

 

Our slavery is revealed

In the abuse of immigrants

The destruction of the planet

The worship of America, the global bully, yay!

The avoidance of uncomfortable truths  

The retreats (thanks, Team USA) into misogyny

The acceptance of the unacceptable, our protection of abusers

 

The wilderness is scary

Leaving slavery is harder than we believed

 

But somewhere out there

In a future we can’t understand

Somewhere out there

Amidst the rocks and thorns

And an infinite horizon

 

There are streams of living water

and the freedom

to live as children of God

to be loved

and to love

Lost and Found

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The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.

          Popularly attributed to Mahatma Gandhi

 

It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership.

          Nelson Mandela

 

Everybody can be great...because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.

          Martin Luther King, Jr.

 

Servant-leadership is more than a concept, it is a fact. Any great leader, by which I also mean an ethical leader of any group, will see herself or himself as a servant of that group and will act accordingly.

          M. Scott Peck

 

If you want to be great in God’s Kingdom, you must be the servant of all.

          Some guy named Jesus

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Jesus said it

Some very amazing people have lived it

Not perfectly, no

But profoundly

 

We know their names

The great ones like Mandel, Gandhi, MLK Jr

More

The not-so-famous ones, like Alex Pretti, Steve Hayner

(I’d list folk, but you won’t know them)

 

In God’s game plan

Leaders are servants

Their job is to serve

They are to be people for others

 

Maya Angelou said it well,

“A leader sees greatness in other people. He nor she cannot be much of a leader if all she sees is herself.”

 

Jesus was a servant leader.

He emptied himself, he humbled himself for the sake of those he loved

(which is everyone)

He gave of himself, expended himself to the point of

Death

 

This tells us a lot about what we call

The Kingdom of God

 

It’s a bad name (sorry, Jesus)

Because we don’t understand it

Kingdoms have Kings

Kingdoms are places where some people dominate

Where they rule over other people

 

In kingdoms, the people at the top get served

By the people on the bottom

That is the earthly equation

 

Yeah, I guess it is fine to talk about a Kingdom

But only if the ruler is the God who is Love

 

But most of us really don’t get it

We cannot conceive; it does not compute

That God is a servant God

 

We say we see God in Jesus

But do we?

Or do we identify God with the powerful ones

The rich ones

 

Are we the disciples of dominion?

Do we have a colonial approach to power

Seeing ourselves as those with the right to conquer,

to occupy, to plunder?

 

How did we get to a place

Where a greedy and predatory leader

Turns the People’s House into a gross and gaudy palace?

 

Where those who are supposed to protect us and fight for justice

Fly around in private jets, chug beer with men who, in the thrill of victory

Reveal toxic masculinity

Where one who is to protect us cosplays authoritarian leadership?

 

How did we get a leader who says

“I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution".

 

This does not line up with Jesus teachings about power

You know, that inconvenient stuff most of Christianity ignores

 

The first shall be last and the last first

Those who would be first must be the servants of all

Give all you have and give to the poor (you know, those lazy moochers)

 

This does not line up with Jesus on the cross

With “Father, forgive them.”

 

At so many places

In our capitals, in the boardrooms of our corporations

In our churches

 

We have leaders who are predators.

Who see the systems they lead

as there for their own personal pleasure and benefit

 

Who take rather than give,

Who dismantle services for others for their benefit?

Who destroy the planet for profit

 

True leaders serve

Faux leaders abuse

 

And we see it every single day.

 

So what do we do?

We become the conscience of Empire

We become the thorn in the side of the oppressors

We stay faithful to the teachings of Jesus

We advocate for the vulnerable

We seek to help and heal

 

We do what Jesus did.

 

 

Tired of Waiting

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“We cannot arrive at the perfect possession of God in this life, and that is why we are travelling in darkness. But we already possess Him by grace, and therefore in that sense we have arrived and are dwelling in the light.  But oh! How far have I to go to find You in Whom I have already arrived!”

― Thomas Merton, The Seven Storey Mountain

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Sometimes I feel like I spend my life

living “in between”

 

Between two worlds?

Between “heaven” and “hell”?

Between ignorance and understanding?

Between the beginning and the end?

 

There is always this tension

between what I know to be true

and what I experience as true

between promise

and actuality

 

I am both/and

I am a child of heaven and have feet mired in the ooze

I am loved by the Sacred, and yet often feel so unlovable

God dwells in me, and yet God often feels so distant

 

In grace I have already “arrived”

And yet the destination seems so far away

 

Perhaps the real spiritual task

for me, for all of us,

Is to realize, become awake to that

our connection to God, or rather God’s connection to us

is always changing, evolving

We move from grace to grace, glory to glory

Stumbling all the way

 

The key to growth, to maturation,

to growing up into Jesus,

is not “trying harder.”

It is (as Isaiah would put it),

“waiting”

 

What does it mean to “wait upon the Lord”?

 

I think it means to hope, to trust, to listen, to hear

to reach up, in the midst of our stumbling journey

and find that the hand we sought

childlike

to lead us on

was there, all along

We are not ready, yet

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“A guilty suffering spirit is more open to grace than an apathetic or smug soul.' –

              Edna Hong Bread & Wine (day 5)”

 

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Ah Lent

a time that starts in ashes

and ends in death

 

It is but a momentary suffering

leading to a greater gift

that of release

and life

and hope

 

We enter Lent embracing a journey

that takes us into the valley of death.

We can not find our way to the Garden

any other way

 

A pattern is here

we all can see and grab

 

that sense that all is not ready

we are not ready

to receive

we are not ready

to receive love and hope

 

not because the gift is not ready

but because we have, in the midst of life

gotten immersed in what is not life

or love

or grace

 

We do not act justly

offer mercy, or live as servants of all.

 

Instead, we chase after gods of our own making

And seek dominion rather than sacrifice

Accumulation rather than generosity

 

In Lent, we stop

and listen,

we reflect and go deep within

 

In Lent, we realize there is no room

for spiritual arrogance or smugness

and there is no need

for spiritual despair, no need to abandon hope

 

We realize instead

that the heart opened

receives the gifts

we yearn to receive

 

justice and joy

When your enemy falls

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“Do not gloat when your enemy falls; when he stumbles, do not let your heart rejoice”         Proverbs 24:17).

 

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable; it keeps no record of wrongs; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

          I Corinthians

 

“Ignorance and fanaticism is ever busy and needs feeding. Always it is feeding and gloating for more.”

          Clarence Darrow

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Anyone feeling bad for Amber Glen?

For some, the answer was clear.

No!

 

We don’t like her values; she’s just queer.

 

She should have practiced and shut her mouth

Sung the praises of our great leader

And kept silent about brutality and oppression

 

Anyone worried about the pain and terror inflicted by ICE?

Anyone upset about lies spoken and laws broken?

 

No!

 

Because we won

We owned the libs

We have the power

 

And we like it

We not only like it, we rejoice.

 

We delight in the failure of our enemies

We savor their pain

 

For some it is not that easy.  That is not a path we can thoughtlessly take.

We wonder, what do we do with such hate?

With such a disregard for the humanity of others?

When it is our hate and disregard?

 

It is a disturbing thing to see a profound lack of compassion

An inability to see the “other” as a person

 

When others do it, we are appalled

How could they be so uncaring?

 

Amber Glen, Alex Pretti, Renee Good

Fodder for disdain

The immigrant, snatched from his job,

Just someone who stole a “real” American's job.

 

Go ICE go

I hope you lose

 

But what do we do when we are the ones who delight in the pain of others?

 

When we experience the thrill of “their” defeat.

That ICE agent, on his ass on the Ice

The person who, outed for racism, has lost their job.

 

Sometimes it is us, thirsting for the blood of our enemies

 

Am I wrong?

 

We can deflect.  We can say, “Well, they REALLY deserved what they got

They are villains, not victims (unlike us)

And at some level, that might be true.

 

But is there not something about wishing another ill,

About savoring another’s pain

That is

 

Just wrong?

 

When Jesus saw evil, he wept.

When Jesus experienced evil, he forgave.

 

I am unwilling to give evil a free pass

Some people need to be stopped

They need to fail

I can even desire their defeat

 

But what I do next is important

I can rejoice that justice is done,

That karma has struck

 

Does that mean I can erase the person and

simply not care about them? As a person?

 

How will I think about Donald Trump when justice finally comes?

If he goes down hard, I will be glad that the evil has ended

That justice has come

 

I will think about the immigrants, the young girls violated

The people he fired, the programs he destroyed, and

I will rejoice that he has fallen from power

 

I will dance for joy for the planet

 

But then?

It haunts me, the idea that I will be unable to see him,

And so many others,

As people. Who fear and feel pain.

 

I wonder,

What do I lose,

when I lose compassion and empathy?

When I gleefully relegate those I despise

To hell (or whatever other punishment I can envision)?

 

I can justify such a response, can’t I?

Schadenfreude

Especially when I see it as justice

The triumph of good over evil

 

But still I wonder.  What is lost?

Does a piece of “me” go missing?

I don’t have an answer

God, forgive them

I’m not mad at you

Are you OK?

 

Still I wonder

A culture of violence

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… violence is a culture unto itself; it is not something one dons like a hat when dealing with the “enemy” and then gets set aside at the end of the confrontation.  Once violence enters the arena, it creates a culture that is very difficult to eradicate.  In fact, liberation in the true sense also means liberating the “enemy” from its own violence.  This is why nonviolence is often one of the most powerful tools in any resistance movement.

          Mitri Raheb, Faith in the Face of Empire

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It has become an estimable thing,

this oppression

 

Masked warriors

crusading against the enemy

the foreigner

those foul, dangerous denizens who lurk

seeking to destroy the very fabric

of our nation

 

Those dark malevolent purveyors of evil

who eat our pets

and speak in strange tongues

who shred our “traditional” values

(the ones we don’t actually live out ourselves)

 

Those enemies of “our God,”

who worship evil gods who demand

our destruction

those barbarians, poised to destroy

all that we hold dear

empire

 

Violence is necessary

isn’t it

to protect and suppress

armed soldiers in the street

a small price to pay

 

It is justifiable then

when, for the sake of freedom

we erase freedom

when we violently suppress

 

smashed car windows

a death or two

children incarcerated

women thrown face down on the ground

are a small price to pay

 

the random acts of violence

become the norm

the way it is

 

It becomes who we are

open carry

ICE

concentration camps

 

We find that we cannot stop

we cannot get enough

violence becomes our fuel

our security

 

There is no end

lost

are the teachings of peace

 

We mistake coercion and control

with peacemaking

(peace through strength)

 

We count the sins of others

and count those sins against them

meting out justice

 

In our culture of violence, we do not hear

turn the other cheek,

go the second mile,

suffer the children,

bless and do not curse

welcome the strange

These words have become strange

amid the cacophony of domination;

They should obey,

They deserved it,

They are bad, dangerous… evil.

 

We are overcome by violence

and no longer seek to overcome evil

with good

 

their violence becomes

our violence

 

Thank you, God

for those who step into the abyss

in between

 

who put their hearts, souls, and minds

on the line

Alex, Renee

Mothers with whistles

Young and old

 

Peacemakers

Protectors

Insisting that love wins

That we can overcome evil with good

 

These are the ones who dwell in the shadow of the cross

the ones who walk where Jesus walked

down the long path

through a fragmented world

to the garden